Buddhist teacher, author, social activist, anthropologist, Abbot: Upaya Zen Center

Santa Fe, New Mexico
Joined November 2008
We are grateful to offer the next session of The Measure of Our Humanity, which will explore FREEDOM with teacher, author, and clinical psychologist Jack Kornfield. October 25th, online, recording available. Register for free + by donation here upaya.org/program/the-measur…
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We are so grateful that beloved Buddhist teacher JACK KORNFIELD in Upaya's The Measure of Our Humanity will explore FREEDOM. Join us on October 25th, 11AM MT, free online Register for free + by donation here upaya.org/program/the-measur…
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Joan Halifax retweeted
We have begun Fall Practice Period Sesshin, a special time of year as the leaves turn golden and return their energy to the roots and the earth. Here at Upaya, we settle into a deeper practice in the zendo and invite you to join when you can from home. Online; free: ow.ly/Bxac50ZYHkz
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Joan Halifax retweeted
We look forward to tonight's Dharma Talk at Upaya. Join in person at Upaya, or online here: youtube.com/user/upayazencen…
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Stars hanging over Upaya Zen Center.
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Joan Halifax retweeted
Would you like to work at Upaya? We’re hiring a Facilities Assistant to work with our Facilities Manager in caring for the buildings and infrastructure of Upaya Zen Center. We look forward to receiving your application. Know someone who’d be great at this? Please share. Job description and application: ow.ly/XT1l50ZWS6G
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Joan Halifax retweeted
On this Indigenous Peoples’ Day, Upaya Zen Center honors our close friends who are the original peoples of this land. We bow in gratitude to our teachers, including Roxanne Swentzell, Porter Swentzell, Beata Tsosie-Peña, Alonso Mendes, and many others who have generously shared their wisdom with our community over the years. We are grateful to have grown ancient seeds and rematriated them to Roxanne and her relatives, and look forward to continuing Planting Life alongside her, her family, and the other elders and teachers who carry the precious legacy of teachings that we so deeply honor.
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This is Nobel Laureate Geoffrey Hinton showing precisely where the entire AI industry went wrong. He went along with the trend: “If you have any theory of how the brain works, you can simulate it on a digital computer” unless it’s quantum effects. This is false. The brain is a physical learning system that uses the laws of physics to calculate. It *cannot* be reproduced in digital form, nor can it be simulated. The moment you digitize information, you lose the part that makes it real. By converting it to bits—no matter how many—you lose the infinite resolution of reality. All forms of biological intelligence are 100% ANALOG. This is not an incidental feature of intelligence. It is fundamental to it. We have never simulated intelligence or consciousness on a digital computer because you can’t. LLMs simulate the OUTPUT of intelligence. They do not simulate intelligence itself. They do not learn. They are static piles of human data compressed in high-dimensional math. The whole idea they are intelligent is absurd. You will never get an intelligent digital computer, much less a conscious one. The future of AI is analog computing. When computers use the universe to calculate, when they adapt based on input from the physical world, we’ll be getting closer. Until then, AI is a dead end.
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Joan Halifax retweeted
🍂 We are in the midst of Fall Practice Period, with practitioners in person at our zen center joining our resident body, as well as many joining from around the world virtually. If you would like to join zazenkai tomorrow online for free, register, and you will gain access to all recordings, dharma talks, and opportunities for practice during this time. Online, FREE: ow.ly/Gmcw50ZWjm9
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Joan Halifax retweeted
It is a joy to share this interview with sangha member and chaplain Marilyn Whitney, interviewed by the Cancer Foundation for New Mexico. Read more here: upaya.org/2026/10/a-presence…
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Joan Halifax retweeted
We are in a time of tremendous endings, but something always comes after. 🔥🌱 Join us for AWAKENED ACTION: What Blooms in the Ashes, November 13-15, with Roshi Joan Halifax, Terry Tempest Williams, Valerie Brown, Rebecca Solnit, Molly Crockett, and Christiana Figueres. Together we'll explore the practices of awareness, compassion, resilience, and imagination for a time of turbulence, through teachings, story, practice, and meeting each other warm hand to warm hand. 📍 In person at Upaya Zen Center, Santa Fe, NM 💻 Online from wherever you are 🗓 Nov. 13-15, 2026 In person (waitlist): upaya.org/program/awakened-a… Online: upaya.org/program/awakened-a… #AwakenedAction #SociallyEngagedBuddhism #Upaya #TerryTempestWilliams #RebeccaSolnit #ChristianaFigueres #Sangha #JoanHalifax #ValerieBrown #MollyCrockett
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In Hong Kong and going to the chop carver to get a chop made of Upaya's new logo: Thusness.
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Just landed in Hong Kong. Brief walk under great banyans across from the hotel. Thinking about zenki, undivided activity, and Dogen's realization of just this moment is all there is, no remainder, no one outside of this, nothing left out.
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Joan Halifax retweeted
I'm pretty much on board with @fchollet here. I'd add a little more nuance, since we can't be 💯 certain. But he gives the right intuitions for why current AI is vanishingly unlikely to be conscious, and he's absolutely right about the dystopian outcomes that would follow from treating it as if it is. I make the broader case against conscious AI in this @NoemaMag essay noemamag.com/the-mythology-o…, and in long form in this @BBSJournal collection DOI.org/10.1017/S0140525X250… (with arguments from all sides in the commentaries) 👇🏽
The notion that current AI models are sentient and can suffer, combined with the foolish idea that suffering can be mathematically quantified and weighted between humans and non-humans, could lead us down an incredibly dark and dystopian path. But before it gets to that point, it will rightfully be met with immense backlash from team humans.
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My thoughts turn toward the great poet William Merwin who would have been 99 today. A precious friend...
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My thoughts turn toward the great poet William Merwin who would have been 99 today. A precious friend...
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